In this specification, a “navigation” is a set of information displayed on a web page for the purpose of helping a user to move to a target web page and to know the relative position of the current web page within a web site. The set of information may include hyperlinks to other web pages (hereinafter referred to simply as “links”).
Some existing program products for generating web pages provide a function to create navigations to be displayed on web pages. For example, a way of displaying a navigation on a web page is given in Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application No. 10-149372. Such products implement, as a method for selecting links to be included in a navigation, a first method in which links to all web pages included in a target web site are selected, and a second method in which links to such web pages that have been designated based on relative relationships with a target web page (for example, a parent page, a child page, and so forth) are selected. Significant problems arise, however, when using either of these methods on large-scale web sites.
A large-scale web site may include a plurality of groups of web pages having different themes, e.g., a group of web pages relating to a product A and a group of web pages relating to a product B, although the groups of web pages are linked to a common top page. When making a navigation for such a web site, links to the web pages relating to product A and links to the web pages relating to product B are included in navigations on all the web pages. However, links to the web pages relating to the product B should be excluded from navigations on the web pages relating to the product A, and links to the web pages relating to the product A should be excluded from navigations on the web pages relating to the product B. The first method, however, cannot provide these kinds of exclusions.
Although the exclusions may be provided by using the second method, another problem arises. That is, in a case where navigations are made by using templates in which styles are defined according to relative relationships, they are displayed in the different styles related to the web pages on which they are displayed, even if they are made for links to one web page.
For example, let's assume a case in which display of a link to a parent page of a web page on which a navigation is displayed is defined in a style A, display of a link just to the web page on which the navigation is displayed or a link to a web page which is a sibling page of the web page on which the navigation is displayed is defined in style B, and display of a link to a child page of the web page on which the navigation is displayed is defined in a style C, and in which a child page of “1.htm” in one web site is “2.htm,” a child page of “2.htm” is “3.htm,” a child page of “3.htm” is “4.htm,” and a child page of “4.htm” is “5.htm.” In this case, when navigations are made on “2.htm,” “3.htm,” and “4.htm,” a link to “3.htm” in the navigation on “2.htm” is displayed in the style C, a link to “3.htm” in the navigation on “3.htm” is displayed in the style B, and a link to “3.htm” in the navigation on “4.htm” is displayed in the style A. That is, the links are displayed in different styles corresponding to the pages on which they are displayed, although they connect to the same page “3.htm.” In this case, a navigation that is easy to understand is not provided when users go from one web page to another, and return.
The present invention solves the above-described technical problems; an object of the present invention is to enable generation of an easy-to-understand navigation closed around a particular group of web pages in a web site.